. >> reporter: also at tufts medical center, bruce mendelson, a bystander who ran towards the explosion, not away. >> you are smaller than i remember. >> he was the first to reach victoria, used a t-shirt to tie a tourniquet to her leg. >> the doctor told me that if you hadn't have done that, i would have died. you save midlife. otherwise i would have bled out, because it hit the artery. >> wow. >> reporter: x-rays reveal a one-inch piece of schlep nehrap into victoria's leg. >> so a matter of centimeters. >> reporter: lisa sham bla was in a medical tent at the finish line when victoria was carried in. >> it's so good to see you. >> reporter: but the first to see her in that tent was tyler dodd. >> i can stand up. >> are you sure? >> yeah. >> reporter: in that tent, victoria was hysterical. >> just your voice, it's so calming. >> reporter: tyler then told her he had been hit by shrapnel in afghanistan. he promised she'd be okay. >> he wasn't a soldier in afghanistan, he wasn't in combat. >> reporter: so this is the little white lie that you embraced? >> yeah, i don't regret it. i don't